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Meriting Concern And Meriting Respect, Jon Garthoff

Jon Garthoff

Recently there has been a somewhat surprising interest among Kantian theorists in the moral standing of animals, coupled with a no less surprising optimism among these theorists about the prospect of incorporating animal moral standing into Kantian theory without contorting its other attractive features. These theorists contend in particular that animal standing can be incorporated into Kantian moral theory without abandoning its logocentrism: the claim that everything that is valuable depends for its value on its relation to rationality. In this essay I raise doubts about the prospects for accommodating animal moral standing within a logocentric Kantianism. I argue instead …